Loyalties
by abb3d
Summary: The end of a Republic, the beginning of an Empire. Trying to get into the swing of writing again. Constructive criticism is appreciated.


Loyalties

I remember when the Jedi first found me. I was just another gutter rat living in the slums beneath Coruscant; Abandoned by my parents, an orphan forced to grow up early, forsaking an innocent carefree childhood just for survival, stealing credits and scavenging in the trash alongside other orphans and rejects of society.

I was sitting against a wall, beside a barrel with a fire crackling in it as an effort to keep me warm. The thin clothes I had on were littered with holes, and shredded, barely keeping together. I remember I was shivering. The fire not warming my bones in the cold of the catacomb-like slums. They, one older taller human, greying hair and an eyepatch covering his right eye, scars covering his mean looking face and a Togruta, they both wore the signature brown jedi robes. I peered up at them, eyeing them critically. Usually when two well dressed strangers came down to the slums, nothing good came of it. People tended to disappear whenever it happened.

I remember the younger Togrutan asking me questions. ''Are you alone? Where are your parents?'' I stayed silent. I remember him removing his robe and holding it out to me, noticing me shivering, for protection from the cold. I ignored it, keeping my eyes on the older one.

I don't remember my parents, probably for the better. Had heard from the other orphans talking about theirs. Addicts, prostitutes, drug dealers. Either threw their children away to not have another mouth to feed except their own, or simply sold them off to a life of abusive slavery. Life was hard in the slums, I had accepted that, like so many other that was forced to. I had accepted my fate as just another unwanted.

The Togruta withdrew his robes, keeping it in his arms. The older one spoke again,

''We are jedi, young one. You know of the jedi?''. His voice old and wise, with an accent I did not know from where. Distinct enough I knew he wasn't from Coruscant. I nodded slowly, still keeping silent. He smiled and continued speaking,

''The masters of our order have felt your presence in the force, young one. We ask that you come with us to the temple, to train as a jedi.''

I was to be a jedi? Me; a Jedi, a beacon of Justice and defender of truth, a wielder of the force. That I was to be trained and would be a Jedi. I wanted to follow with them. To leave behind my life as just another gutter rat, orphaned, trash scavenging nobody; to become a jedi! I nodded as hard I could, but before I could tell them that ''Yes I wanna be a jedi!'', I fell unconscious.

I woke up at the temple, lying for the first time that I can remember in a warm soft bed, under an equally soft warm blanket. I don't know for how long I was unconscious. I look to the side of the bed, and see the old jedi standing and looking down at me. When our eyes meet, he smiles.

I trained for years as just another Jedi hopeful, learning the ways of dueling and the force. First time in my life I felt good about my position in life: I was no longer destined to be a nobody, I was to be a Jedi.

Willing myself to forget about my life beneath coruscant, to forget about the others I had lived with, orphans and rejects, people that had once been what would be closest called friends..

What did they matter now? I thought.

They don't. Not anymore.

I remember training alongside other jedi hopefuls. Various faces, various races. My life in the slums scavenging had taught me that race didn't matter.

I did not get along with the other younglings. Most of them had come from happy lives, with still present parents that visited them in the temple. Most of them, Not all. Not me. I had grown resentful of their happy faces. Always smiling. Never knowing what it was to fight for your own survival.

My closest friend of that time was a Rodian boy. Greko. He was also an orphan, like me, but he had been living in an orphanage under the care of the republican government on one of the core worlds, I don't recall which. We met when I first arrived. Two orphans, sharing a bond. It didn't last.

We grew apart during our time there. I remember when we had one of the few moments of free time, he and I sitting together in the library. I was reading some text about the clone wars, he was observing the library and the others. A Twi'lek girl had walked up to him. Asked why he was sitting with me.

After years of training, under various teachers with other younglings, I was finally given the opportunity I felt I deserved. To be a padawan under a Jedi master.

A Twi'lek was to be my master.

I had seen them before in the slums, mainly girls and women as prostitutes. But this one was different, she held herself with a different posture; one that demanded respect. She had blue skin, green eyes. She always wore the brown robes of the order. Always had a kind smile on her face. One of her tentacles, or lekku as I later learned they were called after a verbal hiding from her when I had called it so, had been cut off. She wouldn't tell me why. I really didn't care either way, I had a master. I was to be a Jedi.

That life didn't last, my life in the gutter should have taught me that nothing good last, I was blinded by the shine of becoming a Jedi.

2 years into my tutelage under her, everything changed.

It was early morning, she and I was walking the streets of Coruscant, patrolling and helping whoever and whatever situation we came across. Old ladies with heavy lifting, young children asking questions, or people asking for directions. Really boring stuff. It was like that under her tutelage; no fighting, dueling or force-training. Just helping people. ''Kindness, padawan, goes a long way. Show kindness to everyone you meet, and being a Jedi won't matter, as long as you are kind.'' she had said with a smile, gazing down on me.

I had smiled back, believing her every word to be gospel. And why would her words not be? She was a jedi. My master; someone who actually cared, made me feel like I was wanted.

We had just helped an old lady, a Togruta my master told me, carry boxes into her taxi when my master had gotten a call. I carried on helping the lady, while my master walked a few meters away to answer. I finished carrying the boxes into her taxi and the old lady thanked me.

I smiled at her and waved her off as she entered the taxi and it sped off.

When I turned towards my master, she was not there anymore. I looked around the street, searching through the mass of people for my master. I could not find her. I stayed put where I stood. She would come back, she just had gone somewhere private to take the call.

It could be from the Jedi council.

Looking back on it, it probably was the council.

I stood there what felt like hours, until I heard yelling from down the streets.

''There's one, shoot!'' a clone trooper had yelled, his helmet distorting his voice, and he and his fellow troopers had begun open fire.

Total chaos erupted, people were screaming and running away to not get hit. Childrens terrified crying. Blaster bolts shooting towards me.

I ran as fast as I could. I ran down the street to get away, hearing them still firing as they followed in pursuit. Blaster bolts hitting the street in front of me, behind me, the walls and anything in the way of them. But not me. I ran until my legs burned and could taste blood in my mouth, I ran through alleyways, I jumped over walls, I pushed people aside, some stumbled to the ground, as I ran for my life.

This is how it ends, I thought. Not even a Jedi yet, a somebody, and I was going to be killed.

Eventually, I make it down into the slums, the troopers still on my heels. I sprint into an alleyway. I find a trash dumpster, opened it and jumped in closing it behind me. I held my breath, not daring to make a sound. I could hear the troopers, they were close. Their booted footsteps echoing in the alley. They run past me in the alley. I stay in the dumpster. I wait for seemingly hours. I'm tense. The adrenaline is wearing off, I'm shaking with fear and exhaustion.

Eventually I pass out, the dizzying putrid smell of the dumpster and withdrawal from the adrenaline making it inevitable, sending me into oblivion.

I wake up. I look around my makeshift hideout. Still in the dumpster. How long was I passed out? Days?

The first thing that greets me, apart from the smell of my environment, is a wet feeling between my legs. Cold and clingy. I had pissed myself in my unconscious state. How very Jedi like.

My thoughts go to how I ran from the troopers. Instead of fighting them, or even helping anyone else out of harm's way, I ran for my life. I feel shame. What would master say?

Where did she go?

I straighten myself as much I can, stretching my limbs and back, relieving tensions that comes from sleeping in a cramped trash dumpster. I slowly open up the lid of the dumpster, peeking out. The alley is dark, but there is dim light shining down from above somewhere granting sight. The alley is empty, save for trash scattered around the ground, boxes and empty and destroyed barrels. The old neglected walls are covered in fluids and grime I'd rather not know.

From being a prospective jedi, back down into the slums.

I open the lid fully, struggling to climb out of the container into the alley. My knees buckle when my feet hit the dirty ground, sending me to them, my hands supporting my body from face-planting the ground.

Where's my master? Where did she go?

I try to stand up, knees wobbly. I successfully stand upright, head dizzy and legs weak. Struggling to remain upright, I lean back against the dumpster for support.

Maybe she went to the temple I reasoned, She went to the temple to find out of what was going on.

Yes, that was it. I must go the temple to find my master. Or, at least try to. My thought turn back to earlier when the troopers were trying to gun me down. When was it? Earlier today?

Had I slept through the night and it was tomorrow?

I didn't know. I had to make it to the temple, this I did know. However I could, I had to return to reunite with my master and the other jedi.

My eyes widen, I panic, My-! I reach for my hip, grabbing a familiar shape. I sigh in relief. I unclasp it from my belt, and hold it up.

A Lightsaber: the trusted weapon of any jedi. Like my master's, mine is curved, suited for Form II, for defense and precision. Makashi.

My master had been teaching me on the form by way of spoken lessons and written texts. But minimal to none in actual practice.

Obsolete and practically worthless other jedi had told my master on her chosen form, she had simply waved off their comments. Best used against force wielders and lightsabers, but not anything or anyone else.

Still, felt good to have a weapon on hand, regardless of experience I had with it or its practicality. Especially if those troopers were still looking for me. I clasp it back on belt.

Why were they trying to shoot me?

Another reason to travel to the temple. Maybe my master had the answers

I look around the alley. In a puddle of brownish water I spot something reflecting light coming from somewhere above me.

On uneasy legs I shuffle towards it, feet dragging into trash, the clattering echoing on the walls around me. It's a piece of metal, it's scratched surface reflecting light. I fall on my knees beside the puddle, my exhausted legs, fueled by fear, no longer being able to support my weight. My knees hit the ground, pain and cold being their reward.

I reach towards the metal and pick it up. I gaze upon it's scratched but reflective surface, and see my face.

Shoulder length black hair matted with sweat, and grime courtesy of the container I had passed out in, tired blue eyes, barely able to keep them open in my weak and tired state, thin lips pale from exhaustion and possibly dehydration. It's my face alright, I muse to myself. Not an ugly visage, but nothing noteworthy either, neither manly or womanly.

Androgynous, someone had commented on my appearance, I spitefully recall.

I think back on when I was just another gutter rat, having to hide my face with whatever I could to shield my face from someone accidentally believing I was a girl. Girls didn't last long on their own in the slums.

One time this disgusting Gamorrean had witnessed my face and- I disregard that thought. I do not want to remember. I was lucky it was fat and slow, and I was small and fast enough to run away.

I drop the piece of metal down into the water, making a splashing sounds as it hits the ground. I look down on my clothes, dirty and damp. Black jacket with smudges and spots of colourful fluids. I struggle to take it off and throw it away behind me, hearing it land on the trash covered ground with a thud. My grey tank top beneath thankfully spared from any discolourings. I look at my arms and hands.

My hands.

''You have girly hands!'' I remember one of the other padawans, a Nautolan, mockingly tell me, I remember having tried to beat him up. I ended up on the ground instead for my efforts. One of the jedi masters had intervene to break up the fighting.

Small and thin. From my time in the slums, to my tutelage under my master, I had maintained a slim figure. In the slums because I had to run from dangers daily, and scavenging rarely filled my stomach. And under my master, for never allowing myself to train physically. Whenever I had tried to do so on my own, she had other duties for me, thwarting my efforts.

I would sometimes sneak off whenever I could, into one of the many training areas of the temple, to practice my dueling with whomever or whatever was there. My master would always know where I was, find me, and force me into reading various texts on jedi history or on dueling. Theoretically I could fight, my pride convincing told me, having studies a variety of texts on the subject, but I was never given the chance to prove it.

My pants are filthy, they were once black, but now they resemble the inside of the dumpster. Hopefully they don't smell too bad. The reek of the alley and my unconscious emptying of my bladder is bound to have permeated my clothes, but my nose and it's sense of smell have grown accustomed to the stench. My once shiny black boots likewise; matted, filthy and probably reeking.

If my master saw me in the state I was now, she would be so disappointed.

A disgustingly dirty and foul smelling jedi is no example for anyone to look up to. To her cleanliness was next to godliness, or whatever her words were. She liked to keep clean. Obsessively so.

I never questioned her on it.

I stand up, strength returning to me, my exhaustion finally wearing off. I have to get to the temple. I slowly begin to backtrack the way I had run from the troopers. I walk for minutes, turning a corner before I can see the path up to the city. I stop. I palm my saber, gripping it. I pull it of my belt and stuff it into my trousers just in case the troopers hadn't seen my face, but had seen my weapon. If they did see my face, it wouldn't matter either way. No one will notice me. They won't, I convince myself.

I slowly begin walking forwards again. The further I walk the more movement I can see on the streets before me. No troopers yet. Yet. I stop a couple of meters just shy of the main street. I wait. Watching the people walk by me. No troopers. I take the few last steps into the street.

The street is busy, but not as busy as it once was. I can still se blaster bolt marks on the street and walls when those troopers were trying to kill me. I look to my right, people in front of stores talking, gazing at wares for possible purchase, store owners talking to potential customers, people sitting at benches sipping drinks and chatting, and at the furthest at a junction I see them. I do not if they are the same, but I see a squad of troopers guarding what seems to a road block, pacing and monitoring people walking by them. I take a step back and turn my head to the left. More people, more stores. But no troopers. I begin walking up the street, away from the troopers.

People, human and aliens pass me by as I walk. Some disregard me entirely, some wrinkle their nose, or what passes for a nose, at me. Though if it is for the smell that I can only imagine reeks from me or for my disheveled, grimy appearance I cannot tell. I just continue walking.

After walking for what could be 30 minutes, past several buildings and countless faces, I spot a holo-poster hanging on a wall with the republican insignia on it, next to a café.

''The Jedi have tried to overthrow the chancellor and has made an assassination attempt on his life. They are considered enemies of the Republic and highly dangerous. Any information regarding jedi whereabouts must be directed to any local government representative.''

Oh. So that's why she ran: They tried to kill the chancellor. Leaving me to my fate to save her own life. I stare at the notice in complete silence. What am I going to do?


End file.
